Can Naps Actually Make Me Smarter? Probably. You’ll certainly be able to learn better. Matthew Walker is an Englishman who teaches and researches at UC Berkeley. Along with others like Robert Stickgold and Sara Mednick he’s shown that learning consolidates with naps. Now his recent work make it look like naps don’t just consolidate learning […]
The doctor as drug (3/16/11)
Doctors or Technicians? “I don’t feel like I’m a person anymore, just a bunch of numbers. All she wants to talk about is tests and drugs.” That’s how patients describe some of their doctors these days – technicians. Bright, intelligent, often concerned, but technicians – purveyors of tests, gatekeepers of other technicians who will eventually […]
Thoughts that keep you up at night (3/8/11)
Thinking, Not Sleeping “Honestly, I cannot sleep at night because I get so excited about doing good things for the world, changing the world,” says Miley Cyrus, the Hannah Montana star. Sadly, most of my sleep patients don’t complain of excitement at the wonderful things they are about to do to save our volatile, environmentally […]
How your brain processes pain (2/25/11)
Does What You Expect Change What You Get? Pain is information, how the brain interprets certain stimuli to form sensations almost all humans fear and detest. As Oxford researchers reported last week in Science Translation Medicine, how we individually interpret pain is markedly changed by context: The Study Subjects – 22 healthy people Method – […]
Booze disrupts sleep – and you’re surprised? (2/16/11)
A Different Kind of Nightcap A study on alcohol and sleep from the University of Michigan has gained much press attention – though much of the news is not new. Yes, alcohol powerfully disrupts sleep. It disrupts lots of healthy processes necessary for body regeneration. The real news may be that media people find the […]